The Presbyterian Home on Thurston Road in the 19th Ward played host to the first debate between the three candidates in this year’s election for mayor.

They are Green Party candidate Alex White, a local entrepreneur, activist and opponent of the failed policies of Citygov; the Honorable Lovely A. Warren, Esquire, City Council President and representative of the Northeast District; and Tom Richards, the current incumbent and Bob Duffy’s relict on Rochester’s mayoral throne.

It was an exciting evening as far as such political debates go: a brilliant antithesis between the new, as represented by Alex and Lovely, and the old, as represented by Richards, bent on claiming success for continuing the failed policies of Rochester’s past.

To do Richards some justice, he has been saddled with Duffy’s administration to a man. With such advisors acting as his administrators, how could he act otherwise?

Of course, it obviously never dawned on Richards to stack the deck with his own people, which suggests that he originally never planned to run for re-election.

When Richards concluded the evening by stating that he was just an “old, white man,” he said a lot more than he probably intended.

The debate, facilitated by YNN news reporter Sheba Clark, was conducted in the standard fashion: 3 minutes worth of opening statements by each candidate; questions, answers and rebuttals by the candidates; and finally, the candidates’ closing statements.

What was apparent very early in the piece is that Richards was clearly on the defensive.

Alex, as a small businessman, complained about the number of regulations that inhibit smaller investors from locating into our city. Richards stated that Alex wanted to eliminate all regulations, which was NOT what Alex had said.

Lovely stated that she wished to create a Rochester-based IDA as a counterpoise to COMIDA, so that Rochesterians would get a bite of the development apple. Richards claimed that Rochesterians were already getting their bite. Lovely retorted that “local” in COMIDA terms meant the nine-county area, not specifically Rochester.

Richards claimed that the city had dumped a lot of money ( $1.9 BILLION ) into the neighborhoods. “Dumped” is the operative word. There has been neither foresight nor follow-through to otherwise stabilize and further upgrade neighborhoods. Alex pointed out that such dumping was wasteful, and continued to leave vacant properties in blighted areas. Lovely correctly pointed out that such subsidized housing developments end up concentrating poverty in the poorer areas of town. Her district, the Northeast, is the poorest quadrant in Rochester. Both Lovely and Alex had solutions to this problem: mixed-housing and homesteading, respectively. And more support for neighborhood associations, to better empower them to improve their own neighborhoods.

Richards unhelpfully replied that such funding has largely dried up.

The subject of crime in the neighborhoods was brought up in a question from one of the residents of the Presbyterian Home. Apparently, they were told Thurston Road is NOT safe to go out on!

Alex claimed more police presence was necessary, and that the streets and stores belonged to the neighborhoods. By venturing out there, we would start to take them back. Lovely mentioned the increasing amounts of crime on Chili Avenue, and that she begged for more police presence there, at least a police trailer if not a precinct house. Richards claimed that he had more police in the area, and rather unconvincingly added that action solved the problem of crime on Chili Avenue.

Both Alex and Lovely made it quite clear that neighborhood policing was necessary, far more necessary than a part-time police precinct downtown.

As for crime among youth, Lovely stressed education in a city where the school system has failed the vast majority of our children. Alex stressed recreation centers, extended library hours and youth activities to give them something to do, other than hanging around street corners. Both are necessary.

Even more telling was the question about Rochester’s finances: Alex quoted the city’s debt. Richards claimed that Alex’s figures were both wrong and untrue. Alex promptly replied that those figures came from the city’s own website, leaving Richards looking shabby and deflated.

This is just a sampling of what occurred this evening, a preview of other mayoral debates to come!

What IS true enough is that none of the three candidates HAVE to run, but that they WANT to run! Lovely herself firmly reiterated that remark when Richards made it.

But Richards didn’t seem nearly as passionate about it as did Alex and Lovely. Perhaps it’s hard to justify actions that have benefitted very few people in Rochester in the wake of our notoriously high crime rate, disgraceful child poverty rate and infant mortality rate.

In fact, Rochester sank to 11th in the entire nation for child poverty with Duffy at the helm. We continued to sink to 7th in the nation with Richards in his place.

An out-of-town campaign manager from Albany with a $200,000 price tag attached can’t gloss over those ugly facts, or that something is seriously wrong with the Duffy/Richards administration.

Alex has long been experienced speaking before large audiences, and his ideas make good sense, if a little more extreme than what Rochester is accustomed to. But only because they haven’t been tried yet. And Alex always appears to know what he is talking about. He was unfazed by the questions or the rebuttals this evening.

Lovely appears increasingly comfortable before large groups. Her ideas can be described as “moderate,” yet also making good sense. But education is her rallying cry, even if the school system is NOT within the purview of the mayor’s office.

Tonight, Lovely appeared both feminine and firm. Passionate but restrained. She is certainly NOT a “little girl,” willing to be told to wait her turn, but has become a lady of some considerable political sophistication!

Rochester’s first murder of 2013 took place yesterday, January 14. It was a shooting.

Given Rochester’s lamentable but much deserved reputation as the “murder capital” of New York State, undoubtedly it will not be the last one.

It took place on Roycroft Drive, part of that swathe of Rochester sardonically referred to as “The Fatal Crescent.” That is the neighborhood in which I grew up.

What is particularly galling to me is that my father’s parents lived on Roycroft Drive when they came to America as refugees from war-torn Eastern Europe more than sixty years ago.

Rochester is seen as a dangerous place in which to live, with some neighborhoods more deadly than others.

No amount of spin control offered by the public relations “experts” in Citygov is changing that fact. None of the effusive praise recently offered to Rochester’s mayor or its chief of police seems to be quite sincere. A recent petition to remove the chief of police from his office was ignored by Citygov. Nor is the police chief’s frequent claims that most of Rochester’s violence is “gang related” particularly reassuring.

Yes, people are angry about Rochester’s reputation, but are they angry enough?

Conservatives, in the wake of recent shooting sprees in Newtown, Connecticut and Webster, New York, are more fearful of stricter gun control laws being enacted that they feel will infringe upon their constitutional right to bear and carry arms. They are aware that those spectacular killings were the result of legal weapons that were obtained by people who were not authorized to possess them.

Conservatives also wish for harsher penalties to be meted out to convicted criminals. This means longer periods of incarceration. Yet they are unwilling to fund the building and staffing of more prisons.

Liberals, on the other hand, feel that Rochester’s high crime rate is the result of poverty and ignorance. That’s true enough. Liberals also feel that until those issues are redressed, Rochester’s high crime rate will continue. That, too, is true enough. But what about the majority of us who do not engage in criminal activities? Are we simply to endure living with shootings, youth gangs, street prostitution and open air drug markets until that day comes, if ever?

As for the court system, it seems logjammed and ”politically correct” to the point of immobility. The courts must frequently use “plea bargaining” ( i.e., allowing criminals to plead guilty to a lesser offense with less severe penalties ) in order to get criminals off of the streets…but only temporarily. If not an example of justice, it certainly resembles a case of “Let’s Make A Deal.” Nobody is happy with this, but it allows the courts to close the books on most of our crimes.

Police Chief James Sheppard: His impish grin and pat phrases are no real solution to Rochester's reputation as a violent city.

Tonight, Citygov is hosting one in a series of “Voice of the Citizens” meetings at 500 Carter Street ( the Carter Street Recreation Center ) from 6 PM to 8 PM.

The location is ironic; it is a quarter mile away from where Rochester’s latest murder took place!

Rochester’s mayor and chief of police, as well as other Citygov staff will be there asking for our input to reduce violence in our neighborhoods.

A handout proffered by the Rochester Police Department states that we, the city’s residents, ”are an invaluable component of this process as we work together to discuss solutions to improve our community.”

The handout also lists the discussion topics as being open air drug sales and gate houses; bullying and truancy; gangs, guns and the culture of violence; house parties. Most neighborhood associations have complained about these topics before.

Similar meetings will be held on Tuesday, January 29 at the Edgerton Stardust Ballroom at 41 Backus Street; and on Tuesday, February 5 at Cobbs Hill Park at Lake Riley Lodge, 100 Norris Drive.

This IS an election year for the City of Rochester. It is important that residents attend these meetings and start demanding answers from the mayor and the chief of police, since these questions are NOT new. They have simply never been adequately addressed. Nor will they ever be addressed until we, the people, remind them that they can be removed from office and be replaced by officials who will make the hard choices where crime is concerned.

Chief of Police James Sheppard’s famously impish grin and pat phrase about “bodies dropping” is simply not enough. It never has been.

That is, of course, if we, the people, are truly angry enough with them to see it through.

Let’s face it, Downtown Rochester has been ignored for the last 20 or so years. Most retail businesses have left for the suburbs or closed up entirely. Attempts by the previous city administrations of Ryan and Johnson to “redevelop” or “reinvent” downtown had been half-hearted at best. In fact, ex-mayor Johnson shifted his focus away from downtown during his years in office, despite calling for almost annual feasibility studies on what to do with Midtown. High Falls, the fast ferry and the baseball stadium ( all failures ), were typical of this lack of concern for downtown. Even city council went along with this shift of focus, while whining about the lack of development there. Ex-city councilman Tim Mains even came up with his shuttle bus plan that would transport people from Midtown to High Falls ( from nowhere to no place ) as another example of this lack of interest, at an additional cost to the taxpayers of this city.

But Mains’ shuttle bus was politically inspired. By following Johnson’s lead with dog-like devotion, he hoped to get the ex-mayor’s endorsement for his own mayoral run in 2005. But the best laid plans of mice, men and Mains came to naught. High Falls was an expensive, city-financed failure; so was the shuttle bus. Fellow city councilman Wade Norwood saw himself as the mayor’s crown prince, and Duffy got Johnson’s endorsement in the long run and won the mayoral contest.

The only thing approaching any real plan for revitalizing downtown was Ren Square. It was something, but it was badly flawed, and city council shot it down at the eleventh hour.

So back to the drawing board.

The mayor’s statement that a revitalized downtown will not look like it did fifty years ago is true enough; too much has already left downtown. But plans for office buildings and a few fast food joints will hardly make it an attractive venue, either. With no contracts for Paetec Tower ( in whatever final form it might take ), opting for a more expensive plan for Midtown Tower ( with public monies subsidizing proposed luxury condos there ) and trying to interest the Rochester Broadway Theatre League in the old McCurdy’s site at Midtown ( with the RBTL expecting cushy grants of taxpayer money ), the city administration is spot-dabbing to cure the measles again. This will take years to get done if it ever does, but just in time for the 2013 mayoral election. Perhaps that’s what the mayor is banking on.

Notably, there have been no attempts to attract serious developers for retail businesses downtown, so the city can roll up the sidewalks after five, when the office workers go home.

So, where does that leave us?

Most people have gotten used to having nothing going on in downtown Rochester, and found other venues for shopping, dining and entertainment. Neighborhoods like Monroe, Park, East and University Avenues still attract people, as do the East End, North Winton Village, Corn Hill, the South Wedge, just to name a few. These areas have been financed by private investment, not public funds, and still thrive. Perhaps that’s the open secret that city government refuses to acknowledge.

And Rochesterians have been going to the suburban shopping malls for decades, making a downtown increasingly unnecessary. Free parking might have been a solution years ago, but now, there is little to go downtown for to make use of any free parking plans.

We might simply get used to the fact that downtown will consist of hotels and office buildings, that whatever life is still present in Rochester is to be found in the neighborhoods ( which ought to get more city government support ) and give up any grandiose plans for the redevelopment of the center of the city. We also might remember that every time the city has, in recent memory, stuck its nose into city “development” it has ended in expensive disasters that provide plenty of anecdotes at cocktail parties.

Contributors

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Rich Gardner has been writing about the history, culture and waterways of Upstate New York for years. His articles have appeared in U.S. and Canadian publications, and one book, Learning to Walk. He is an alumnus of Brighton High School and SUNY Geneseo. He operates Upstate Resume & Writing Service in Brighton and recently moved to Corn Hill, where he is already involved in community projects. "I enjoy the 'Aha!' moments of learning new things, conceptual and literal. City living is a great teacher."

Ken Warner grew up in Brockport and first experienced Rochester as a messenger boy for a law firm in Midtown Tower. He recently moved downtown into a loft on the 13th floor of the Temple Building with a view of the Liberty Poll and works in the Powers Building overlooking Rochester’s four corners as Executive Director for UNICON, an organization devoted to bringing economic development to the community. He hopes to use his Rochester Blog to share his observations from these unique views of downtown.